Here are 100 books that What the Buddha Taught fans have personally recommended if you like
What the Buddha Taught.
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Born into an atheist family and a psychiatrist by background, I identified as a Christian in mid-life then became an interfaith minister. I believe everyone has a birthright to discover their own personal nature and purpose and although religion can help, it’s probably only a phase through which a properly evolved consciousness passes. You can read all the non-fiction and sacred texts you like, but I find spiritual fiction to be the best medium to explore and share fundamentals like this.
This 1970 novella transported me into a world of seagulls, how they live and how they fly, and one, Jonathan, who decides to be different, to defy conformity, to go further and faster, like my own striving for something more, for experiences beyond the mundane.
I never thought I’d identify with a seagull, but this wonderful bird’s world view is exactly the same as that of anyone who sees more than what’s just in front of them.
This classic work is now available for the first time in paperback. Since 1951, when the last of the Witchcraft Acts was repealed, many books have been written about the reappearance of witchcraft and the development of a pagan theology. Churchmen have denounced it. Sociologists have wondered at it. Journalists have penned sensational stories about it. But until the publication of this book, no one had told the real story of it from the inside as frankly as it is told here.
Doreen Valiente, one of witchcraft's most widely known figures, was a close friend of the late Gerald Gardner,…
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
I'm Carmen F. Vlasceanu, PhD, FIH, hospitality executive, mentor, and author who believes in leading with a good heart and living with purpose. Through my book Dare to C.A.R.E. and the life coaching I offer, I help people reconnect with their inner power, serve others authentically, and grow in every area of life. As a single mom, global citizen, and lifelong learner, I’ve walked through burnout, reinvention, and bold dreaming. These books have helped me rediscover my voice, redefine my mission, and remember what really matters. They helped ground me in faith, encouraged my evolution, and reminded me why meaningful connection always comes first.
This book helped me shift my mindset, and I first picked it up during a stressful phase of my life. I gave myself some time to simply breathe and take it in. It reminded me that the “now” is not just a passing second, but a sacred space where peace and clarity live.
I love how it helped me stop living in the echo of yesterday or the fear of tomorrow. I remember closing my eyes and whispering, “This moment is enough,” and feeling my shoulders relax for the first time in weeks. It helped me feel more connected with myself, my son, my clients, and in doing so, intentionally live every moment with more compassion, stillness, and supremacy.
**CHOSEN BY OPRAH AS ONE OF HER 'BOOKS THAT HELP ME THROUGH'**
The international bestselling spiritual book, now with a new look for its 20th anniversary. Eckhart Tolle demonstrates how to live a healthier, happier, mindful life by living in the present moment.
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'I keep Eckhart's book at my bedside. I think it's essential spiritual teaching. It's one of the most valuable books I've ever read.' Oprah Winfrey
To make the journey into The Power of Now we will need to leave our analytical mind and its false created self, the ego, behind. Although the journey is challenging, Eckhart…
I have spent the last 50 years exploring the intersection of Eastern and Western thought and spirituality. Along the way, I experientially learned the details of three of my former lifetimes: as a rabbi in 3rd-century Alexandria, as a tantric yogini and follower of Achi Chokyi Nyima in China, and as the legendary courtesan Lady Mori, who became the disciple and lover of the Zen master Ikkyu in 15th-century Japan. Studying the ways my previous incarnations are interconnected has taught me much about how the principles of karma and reincarnation function in real-time in the actual world, and I treasure the opportunity to share these insights with you.
When it was published in 1992, Rinpoche’s superior translation replaced the first English translation of The Tibetan Book of the Dead from 1927. This has been a go-to for anyone preparing for their own death or that of a loved one, when the Western way of dying falls short. This book is an indispensable guide to the process of life and death.
Explains the Tibetan understanding of what happens when a person dies, and how this can help in a person's daily life, in caring for the terminally ill and the bereaved, and to deepen one's understanding of life.
A Duke with rigid opinions, a Lady whose beliefs conflict with his, a long disputed parcel of land, a conniving neighbour, a desperate collaboration, a failure of trust, a love found despite it all.
Alexander Cavendish, Duke of Ravensworth, returned from war to find that his father and brother had…
I became Buddhist while I was working in Southeast Asia, in Thailand specifically. Here’s one of the great lessons I learned, or perhaps it’s merely a koan, and that is this, no true Buddhist is Buddhist. It’s my own saying and one that I live by because Zen, Tibetan or Theravada are all structured disciplines with ritual and even recognized leaders. And I think the Buddha would laugh one of his full bellied roars to learn that there were, in some cases, global organizations all named in his honor. That’s not to make light of the way of organized Buddhism, merely to say that it isn’t my way.
I first encountered the philosophy of physicist Bohm in another book by the philosopher Renée Weber (Dialogues with Scientists and Sages) in which she, the Dalai Lama, and Bohm (among others) explore, well, everything. But Bohm’s own exploration blends Buddhist concepts with physics. One of the many reasons I am Buddhist myself is its architecture and allowance for new concepts including physics theory and the reality of light itself. His implicate order for the universe explains more about its reality than accepted current theory. I’m no physicist nor towering intellectual, but I am following the Buddha’s advice to figure it out for myself. This book helped immensely. Sadly his work is overlooked by the scientific community.
There are few scientists of the twentieth century whose life's work has created more excitement and controversy than that of physicist David Bohm (1917-1992). For the first time in a single volume, The Essential David Bohm offers a comprehensive overview of Bohm's original works from a non-technical perspective. Including three chapters of previously unpublished material, each reading has been selected to highlight some aspect of the implicate order process, and to provide an introduction to one of the most provocative thinkers of our time.
Bertrand Jouvenot is a French marketing influencer and prominent writer on business, management, marketing, branding, and digital. He has spent over twenty years in a variety of senior marketing roles. He now teaches at several business and fashion schools for Chinese and European students as well as consulting to various businesses. Bertrand lives in Paris, France, and writes for Le Monde, The Harvard Business Review, Forbes, Mediapart, Stratégies, le Journal du Net, Les Echos, and Influencia, the prestigious French quarterly print magazine spotting trends in marketing, communication, and creation.
Start with the beginning. The Dhammapada is the Buddhism inaugural book. In it are the words of the Buddha himself, teaching that all suffering stems from desire and that the way to attain freedom is to purify the heart and follow the way of truth. Very accessible, the words used in this ancient book capture the Buddha's original intuitions, thoughts, and teachings with great simplicity.
The Dhammapada is one of the most popular and accessible books in all of Buddhist literature. In it are the words of the Buddha, teaching that all suffering stems from desire and that the way to attain freedom is to purify the heart and follow the way of truth. Thomas Byrom's verse rendering of the Dhammapada uniquely captures the Buddha's original teachings with simplicity and lyricism.
I’ve always enjoyed books that introduce me to faraway places, cultural narratives, and the writers behind the stories. After retiring from college teaching, I decided to write one myself. I’m a Mark Twain scholar, so I followed Twain’s lecture tour through Australasia, India, and South Africa. One of my goals was to expose my research methods to my readers, and writing in the first person made that easy. What I hadn’t foreseen was how much the process would force me to confront my own past—exposing the radical differences between Mark Twain and Me.
In An End to Suffering, Mishra records his efforts to understand the Buddha’s relevance to today’s world. Like Aiyar, he is conscious of the differences between India and the West and the liminal world of individuals who, like him, live between them. Unlike her, he delves deeply into history, crisscrossing centuries, countries, and eastern and western literatures and philosophies, through which—over several decades—he moves and matures. Mishra confronts the writers and philosophers he studies, asking how their precepts affect him and the world in which he lives, and he doesn’t mind letting us know that his responses changed over time. I resonate with this book because it is a spiritual journey, written out of Mishra’s thoughtful, learned, search for stability in a world of unceasing change.
An End to Suffering is a deeply original and provocative book about the Buddha's life and his influence throughout history, told in the form of the author's search to understand the Buddha's relevance in a world where class oppression and religious violence are rife, and where poverty and terrorism cast a long, constant shadow.
Mishra describes his restless journeys into India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, among Islamists and the emerging Hindu middle class, looking for this most enigmatic of religious figures, exploring the myths and places of the Buddha's life, and discussing Western explorers' "discovery" of Buddhism in the nineteenth century.…
The Duke's Christmas Redemption
by
Arietta Richmond,
A Duke who has rejected love, a Lady who dreams of a love match, an arranged marriage, a house full of secrets, a most unneighborly neighbor, a plot to destroy reputations, an unexpected love that redeems it all.
Lady Charlotte Wyndham, given in an arranged marriage to a man she…
My search for meaning didn't come when I hit midlife. Ever since I was a kid, I gravitated toward books and movies that offered lessons about living, which I'd try to incorporate into admittedly limited childhood opportunities. As I grew older and gained more agency, I was able to apply what I learned to more significant decisions, which often led me down a very different path than my peers. I suppose, in hindsight, this accounts for why my first three books were released by a publisher in the personal transformation space. I'm happy to share the 5 books that have helped me on my journey toward living a better life...so far.
Siddhartha is the story of an epic journey of a man traveling through ancient India, with life lessons subtly woven through the narrative.
Ultimately, this book is about how all things are connected through nature, and more specifically, how attaching too much weight to individual events—good, bad, happy, sad—misses the totality of appreciating how those events work together to make a more joyful, meaningful life.
Here the spirituality of the East and the West have met in a novel that enfigures deep human wisdom with a rich and colorful imagination.
Written in a prose of almost biblical simplicity and beauty, it is the story of a soul's long quest in search of he ultimate answer to the enigma of man's role on this earth. As a youth, the young Indian Siddhartha meets the Buddha but cannot be content with a disciple's role: he must work out his own destiny and solve his own doubt-a tortuous road that carries him through the sensuality of a love…
Philosophy was once the crown jewel of human knowledge, addressing all aspects of the natural world and human existence, and a font of moral guidance and inspiration. Today it is a marginal academic exercise, largely ingrown, inscrutable to even the well educated, and mostly ignored by the wider public. My quest has been to help restore the relevance and importance of philosophy in today’s world.
The fascinating journey of the Greek philosopher Pyrrho to India as part of the entourage accompanying Alexander the Great and his encounters there with Indian wise men is central to Beckwith’s book.
I was excited to find his portrayal of Pyrrho as a ‘Greek Buddha’ confirming my earlier research on the compelling parallels between the Pyrrhonian sceptics of ancient Greece, who followed Pyrrho, and the Buddhist tradition. Beckwith shows that Pyrrho’s two-year stay with Alexander in Gandhara in northwestern India at a time of Buddhist presence there provided ample opportunities for extended contact.
The Indian wise men, he demonstrates, were very likely early Buddhists. He reinforces this by drawing additional parallels between the two traditions.
Pyrrho of Elis went with Alexander the Great to Central Asia and India during the Greek invasion and conquest of the Persian Empire in 334-324 BC. There he met with early Buddhist masters. Greek Buddha shows how their Early Buddhism shaped the philosophy of Pyrrho, the famous founder of Pyrrhonian scepticism in ancient Greece. Christopher I. Beckwith traces the origins of a major tradition in Western philosophy to Gandhara, a country in Central Asia and northwestern India. He systematically examines the teachings and practices of Pyrrho and of Early Buddhism, including those preserved in testimonies by and about Pyrrho, in…
I’m a long-time meditator and student of Buddhism, and a retired but still active academic. I am a cognitive scientist specialising in the learnable aspects of real-world intelligence. My meditation ‘career’ started when I was an undergraduate studying psychology at Cambridge in the late 1960s, and has since taken me to America, India, and Japan, as well as to many retreats in the UK with visiting teachers from all the main branches of Buddhism. In my academic life, I have a doctorate in psycholinguistics from Oxford and have been Professor of the Learning Sciences at the University of Bristol and the Research Director of the Centre for Real-World Learning in Winchester. My books on the crossover between Eastern and Western Psychology include The Psychology of Awakening, Wholly Human, Noises from the Darkroom, and The Heart of Buddhism.
Stephen Batchelor is an old and dear friend of mine – partly because I love his radical ‘take’ on Buddhism. He knows his traditional Buddhist stuff all right: he was a Tibetan Buddhism monk for eight years, and studied in a Korean Zen monastery for four. To some, he is a heretic because his books peel away the cultural superstitions that have befogged the Buddha’s original teachings – such as karma and reincarnation - and reveal a message that is as relevant and insightful today as it was two and a half millennia ago. But his deep and lightly-worn scholarship shines through and – to me at least – he is bang on: both down to earth and utterly inspirational.
A renowned Buddhist teacher's magnum opus, based on his fresh reading of the tradition's earliest texts
Some twenty-five centuries after the Buddha started teaching, his message continues to inspire people across the globe, including those living in predominantly secular societies. What does it mean to adapt religious practices to secular contexts?
Stephen Batchelor, an internationally known author and teacher, is committed to a secularized version of the Buddha's teachings. The time has come, he feels, to articulate a coherent ethical, contemplative, and philosophical vision of Buddhism for our age. After Buddhism, the culmination of four decades of study and practice…
This book follows the journey of a writer in search of wisdom as he narrates encounters with 12 distinguished American men over 80, including Paul Volcker, the former head of the Federal Reserve, and Denton Cooley, the world’s most famous heart surgeon.
In these and other intimate conversations, the book…
James Ford is a Zen teacher and the author or editor of five books on Zen history and spirituality. His history of Zen in the West, Zen Master Who? captured the personalities who formed our emerging Western schools, while the Book of Mu, which he compiled and edited with Melissa Myozen Blacker is considered essential for any contemporary student of koans, Zen’s arcane spiritual discipline.
Journalist and long-time Zen student Barbara O'Brien offers the only readable, concise, and yet comprehensive survey of Zen's history, the development of its teachings from the beginnings of Buddhism to the dawn of the twenty-first century. She finds a genuine middle ground between an appreciation of the received tradition and the best of modern scholarship. A masterful accomplishment.
A comprehensive, accessible guide to the fascinating history of Zen Buddhism--including important figures, schools, foundational texts, practices, and politics.
Zen Buddhism has a storied history--Bodhidharma sitting in meditation in a cave for nine years; a would-be disciple cutting off his own arm to get the master's attention; the proliferating schools and intense Dharma combat of the Tang and Song Dynasties; Zen nuns and laypeople holding their own against patriarchal lineages; the appearance of new masters in the Zen schools of Korea, Japan, Vietnam, and later the Western world. In The Circle of the Way, Zen practitioner and popular religion writer…
